It was late November freshmen year, and I was playing basketball. I don’t remember how, but it came to my attention that George Steinbrenner was a Williams alum. I said, ‘What the heck? Let’s take a shot.’ So I wrote him this long, cheesy letter where I talked about the leaves changing colors in Williamstown and what a great time of year it was. I lied and said I was a Yankees fan. I grew up a hardcore Mets fan. I asked for an internship or whatever he could do.

The next day I realized that I didn’t have an address to send the letter to. So I emailed the President at the time, Morty Schapiro, and said, ‘hey, I have this letter. Do you happen to have Mr. Steinbrenner’s address?’ Within a couple of hours Morty wrote back to me. He said, ‘this sounds like a great idea, I’d love to help you out. I know George myself. Why don’t you bring the letter to my office, and I’ll send him a letter with your letter and make sure it gets to him.’

I did that the next day and within a week I had a couple of calls from the Yankees, saying they wanted me to come down to do some interviews. I ended up going down the first week of spring break. We won the national championship in basketball on Saturday. Monday morning I went in to New York. I met with a few people and toured around. At the end, I met with the COO who said, ‘Mr. Steinbrenner’s already signed off on your internship. Where would you like to work?’

The Williams alumni network is an amazing thing. Just ask Will Kuntz ’06. Kuntz, an avid sports fan, spent all three summers during college working for the New York Yankees. After graduation he joined the Yankees full-time, working his way up to the title of Director of Pro Scouting – or ‘Yankees whiz kid’ as the New York media called him. Last spring he left baseball to become the Director of Player Relations for Major League Soccer. From the league’s offices in New York, Kuntz helps teams across the country negotiate contracts, comply with league regulations, and attract top players. For a sports fan with a legal background, it is, more or less, a dream job.

For Kuntz, the journey into professional sports all began with a simple letter. During the late fall of his freshman year Kuntz learned that New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner was a Williams alum. A New York native who grew up during the Yankees’ late-90s glory years, Kuntz figured he had nothing to lose and decided to reach out to Steinbrenner. “I wrote him this long, cheesy letter where I talked about the leaves changing colors in Williamstown and what a great time of year it was. I lied and said I was a Yankees fan. (I grew up a hardcore Mets fan.) I asked for an internship or whatever he could do.”

The next day, Kuntz realized he had a problem: he didn’t have an address to send his letter to. Without any prior introduction, Kuntz emailed then-Williams President Morty Schapiro to explain the situation and ask for Mr. Steinbrenner’s address. “Within a couple of hours Morty wrote back to me. He said, ‘this sounds like a great idea – I’d love to help you out. I know George myself. Why don’t you bring the letter to my office, and I’ll send him a letter with your letter and make sure it gets to him.’”

A week later, the Yankees called. They wanted to bring Kuntz in for a few interviews. “I ended up going down the first week of spring break… I spoke with a few people and toured the stadium. At the end of the day, I met with the COO who said, ‘Mr. Steinbrenner’s already signed off on your internship. Where would you like to work?’”

When Eric Kang was in middle school, his music teacher told him that if he could imagine himself doing anything besides music, he should do that. Kang took the advice and entered Williams prepared to become a doctor. After helping direct the music for a play his freshman year, however, Kang’s love of music started to take over. His schedule went from one music class to two to three. “As I proceeded through college, I realized that music was becoming the only thing I wanted to do.”

When graduation rolled around, Kang abandoned his medical school aspirations and went to New York to try and make it as a musician. Five years later, he is hard at work on a number of fronts—directing shows, performing, teaching, and taking on a handful of odd jobs to help pay the bills. “I’m very blessed to be doing what I’m doing—I feel that way almost every day.”

I caught up with Kang in Midtown Manhattan to hear about his journey and learn about the ups and downs of life as a professional musician.

I’ve always loved clothes – loved putting stuff together. But at Williams, there’s no major for fashion. I went in thinking I was going to be a theater major because junior year you took a costume design class. When I got to sophomore year, they cut the costume class.

I went to career services junior year and told them that I was into fashion, but they just showed me marketing jobs for Pepsi and Coke. I tried to do that because it was still creative and offered some security, but it wasn’t a good fit.

I did a photo shoot one winter study. I called all my friends and told them to bring their craziest clothes. I styled everybody and teased their hair out. It was so fun, and I realized, ‘this is what I want to do. I don’t know why I’m fighting it.’

But after graduation, I realized that I needed an actual job and doing random photo shoots can’t pay bills. So I did an advertising internship, and the CEO took me to lunch and told me, ‘this isn’t for you.’ Then I did a PR internship and the owner of that company said the same thing.

My college roommate told me that a designer was looking for an intern so I started interning as an errand girl, and that whole world blew my mind. I said, ‘this is what I want to do. Let me stop acting like I need to be in this corporate world when I don’t fit in that world.’